Electronic design automation (EDA) tools are used to design and analyze electronic systems such as printed circuit boards (PCBs) and integrated circuits (ICs, e.g., application specific integrated circuits (ASICs) or systems on chips (SOCs)). ICs can include many thousands and perhaps millions of circuit elements (e.g., transistors, logic gates, diodes, etc.) and interconnecting wires and busses, as well as power grids for the circuit elements. The circuit elements and wires can be formed on many different layers, with various interconnections (e.g, vias) between layers.
Some EDA tools are configured to attempt to handle the issue of electrostatic discharge (“ESD”). ESD generally relates to the transfer of charge between bodies at different electrical potentials. More particularly in connection with ICs, an ESD event can be caused either by Human touch (e.g., HBM) or during machine testing (e.g., MM/CDM) of the IC. An ESD event may alter the electrical characteristics of a semiconductor device, and may even degrade or destroy the device. Because an ESD event is a high surge current event, it has become a major reliability problem in the semiconductor industry.
Although conventional EDA tools can assist in providing some protection for an IC design against ESD events, further improvements remain desirable.